Calgary’s rate of violent crime has skyrocketed 50 per cent over the past five years, according to new data released by Statistics Canada.

The spike in gun violence, sexual assaults, robberies and other crime comes as council prepares to pare its municipal spending by $60 million, including a proposed $7-million cut to the police force’s budget.

According to the data released Monday by the federal agency, Calgary recorded 13,499 violent crimes in 2018, up 12.3 per cent from the previous year. In all, the city saw 83,277 reported crimes last year, an increase of 10.5 per cent from 2017, and a rise of 57.4 per cent since 2014.

While Calgary still ranks favourably compared with other Alberta cities on Statistics Canada’s Crime Severity Index, which assigns a higher weight to more severe crimes, the city’s index rating of 88.1 is well above the national average of 75.

On Tuesday, city council is slated to consider a suite of proposed budget reductions, which could affect as many as 48 city services. Among those, police are set to shoulder one of the largest cuts, though Coun. Ward Sutherland, who sits on the civilian board that governs the force, said the initial proposal from city bureaucrats was much more severe.

“The request from administration was sent to the police service, the police service presented that dollar amount, the police commission did not accept that,” he said.

“So we pushed back with the actual CPS management, because the cuts were too drastic for the original amount that they had said. Our mandate is not to impede the services and safety of citizens, and that’s when we said the max we can do is $7 million — more than that, that’ll cause problems.”

Sutherland said the original proposal from city staff was more than double the one that’s now on the table, which won’t require cuts to front-line officers.

The statistical report, which is derived from data gathered from police forces across Canada, shows Calgary has seen increases nearly across the board for several serious crimes over the past five years.

Some 941 Level 1 sexual assaults were reported in 2018, a 20 per cent rise from the previous year, while Level 2 sexual assaults, which involve bodily harm or the use of weapons, rose by 27 per cent with 40 reported incidents last year.

The past two years, the data shows, have seen a steep rise in violent firearms offences in Calgary, with 67 reported in 2018 following 45 the previous year. Those numbers marked increases of 46 per cent and 78 per cent respectively from the previous years.

Robberies also rose by 13 per cent in 2018 to 1,281, while the number of Level 1 and Level 2 assaults jumped to 5,931 (12 per cent increase) and 2,581 (13 per cent increase) respectively.

Homicides were among the handful of violent city crimes that actually ebbed in 2018, with 18 reported compared to the previous year’s 29.

Police Supt. Ryan Ayliffe said the force has been transparent in demonstrating the connections between Calgary’s rising crime rate and its connection to illegal street drugs and other evolving factors, including the city’s economic downturn.

“We’ve done some reorganizing to make sure we can be proactive on this,” he said.

“There’s a clear connection between some of these issues.”

He noted that after crime complaints jumped in the zone near the Beltline safe drug-use site at the Sheldon M. Chumir Health Centre, an extra beat unit was added to help curtail some of those trends.

Security around the Sheldon M. Chumir Health Centre has stepped up after numerous complaints from the community in Calgary on Tuesday January 29, 2019.Darren Makowichuk/Postmedia

The use of intelligence-led policing has also been able to stay ahead of crime trends, allowing police to adjust how officers are deployed to better deal with emerging patterns.

In a statement, Brian Thiessen, chair of the police commission, said he hopes when council reviews its budget priorities, they consider the potential effect cuts will have on the force’s ability to respond to the rising crime rate.

“The commission is aware of these crime trends and we are just as concerned as the community about cuts to the Calgary Police Service budget,” he said.

“We know citizens want police to have enough funding to respond to crime, to be visible and to engage with the community through prevention programs. We are also concerned about the added pressure on CPS employees who are being asked to do more with less.

“I hope that public safety and employee safety and wellness will be important considerations for decision-makers.”

Meanwhile, while violent crime rates saw the most significant increases, property crime rates continued a more steady ascent, rising three per cent to 57,715. The number has remained relatively stable the past four years after a 35 per cent jump in 2015.

Some 7,267 car thefts were reported in 2018, a slightly more than one per cent increase, while break-and-enters jumped by seven per cent to 9,851. Shoplifting calls saw a 28 per cent rise to 6,012 while investigators saw a nearly seven per cent increase in fraud complaints, which reached 5,145.

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